Second Batch of Yoko Ono Reissues Out Today

07/14/2017

They’re here! The second batch of Yoko Ono‘s reissues are out into the world today. We’ve been honored to partner with Chimera Music on releasing Ono’s musical output from 1968 to 1985, and today marks the release of 1971’s Fly, 1973’s Approximately Infinite Universe, and 1973’s Feeling The Space.

What you hear on Fly is Ono’s disarming combination of opacity and visceral, personal transparency in full bloom. It’s also one of the most unbridled, most captivating soul albums ever made. And that’s right where she wants you: Vulnerable, wide open to any-and-everything, ready to have your world tipped onto its head.

There’s a fury at the core of Yoko Ono’s 1973 rock opus Approximately Infinite Universe that was not apparent on previously recorded efforts. Ono has always been a master of turning pain and sadness into art, but here, there’s a clenched-fist intensity that sets it apart in her deep, unparalleled catalogue. Ono absolutely intended to boggle the boys’ club of the music industry. Fast-forward to today, and Approximately Infinite Universe stands as a template for powerful female artists to follow in the years ahead.

The fact that the once-reviled Yoko Ono is inspiring a new generation of activists comes as no surprise if you’ve listened to Feeling the Space, her personal-is-political 1973 album that resonates remarkably forty-four years later. On such songs as the righteous chant “Woman Power,” the empathetic ballad “Angry Young Woman,” the hilarious proto-grrrl “Potbelly Rocker,” and the satirical “Men Men Men,” Ono sings in surprisingly straightforward fashion about the burdens carried by women and the mandate for feminism. Dedicated “to the sisters who died in pain and sorrow and those who are now in prisons and in mental hospitals for being unable to survive in the male society,” it’s an emotional exploration of the psychological toll of oppression.